From: hekunze@math.uwaterloo.ca (Herbert Eduard Kunze)
Subject: Wrestling TidBits - 05/29
Date: 1997/05/29
Message-ID:
X-Deja-AN: 244853787
Sender: news@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca (news spool owner)
Organization: University of Waterloo
Newsgroups: rec.sport.pro-wrestling
[Wrestling TidBits]
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[ RAW ] this week returned to being head-to-head with WCW's Monday Nitro.
As a result, the WWF pulled out all of the stops for the TV show,
featuring the return of Shawn Michaels to the ring (stripping the mystery
from what would have been his return at the King of the Ring), a
heavily-pushed tag title change, and the Undertaker re-joining Paul Bearer.
From a wrestling standpoint, this show was better than recent weeks. When
RAW first went to the two-hour format, it featured lengthier matches, which
was sometimes a good thing and sometimes a bad thing. Guys that could
actually put together longer matches were finally pushed, definitely a good
thing. But there were not enough of them to fill the show, so guys without
that ability also worked longer matches, horribly revealing the lack of the
depth in the promotion. In recent weeks, despite the flashy new lead-in,
RAW was Nitro, with the actual wrestling playing a secondary role to all
other goings-on, and matches being kept short. This show, featuring a hot
tag title switch, with the unlikely and reluctant team of Shawn Michaels &
Steve Austin winning the tag titles from Owen Hart & Davey Boy Smith in a
long bout, was better wrestling-wise, if only because of that match. Some
might argue that Michaels' return to the ring was wasted on the TV show,
but it indicates how desperately the WWF wants to keep the ratings up. The
dissension between the new championship partners is a very entertaining
story line.
Other than that, RAW was FMW, showing several clips of the bread-and-butter
style of that promotion, as Mankind continued to talk about his past in an
entertaining interview. More garbage wrestling was promised next week. With
the talk of Wing Kanemura and Mr. Gannosuke coming in for a stint, you've
got to think that this is leading to a garbage match, perhaps between
Kanemura and Mankind.
The actual wrestling on the show was eclipsed by the main event, not
altogether a bad thing. Next week, Michaels & Austin agreed to defend the
titles against the Legion of Doom. Since a Davey Boy Smith & Owen Hart vs.
Legion of Doom tag title match has been announced locally for the King of
The Ring, it seems quite possible that plans are to quickly tear the
Michaels & Austin team apart. Add to this the speculation that Michaels
wants out of the WWF, which may just be a crazy rumour, and next week's RAW
becomes a very interesting must-see, IMO.
The other big angle pushed last week, to offset the return [Chris Benoit]
of Nitro, saw Paul Bearer start to ramble about burying the
Undertaker's parents. He said that there was a third grave that night, and
before he could get any further, the Undertaker came out, teased an attack
on Bearer, and finally submitted to him as the show went off the air, with
the commentators sputtering in disbelief at an outcome that anybody could
have seen coming. You've got to wonder why, if Bearer had such a powerful
secret to hold over the Undertaker, these two feuded so long.
[ - ] With Kevin Sullivan taking a vacation as WCW booker, Chris Benoit has
been switched into the feud with Meng. Despite the push on TV, the
only way to give Meng any credibility in the feud was to put him over in
the first match, which was better than most people could get out of Meng,
but still a complete waste of Benoit. Unfortunately, we are going to have
to sit through a lengthy feud between the two, which immediately sounds
like one less reason to order upcoming WCW PPVs. In Sullivan's absence,
Eric Bischoff, JJ Dillon, and Terry Taylor are picking up the booking
chores, but so many players on top have control over their stories or just
do what they want, that we can probably only credit/blame these guys for
the undercards. Certainly, Kevin Nash has played a sizeable role in the NWO
story line booking.
[Great Muta][ - ] On Tuesday, Kenta Kobashi & Johnny Ace defeated Akira
Taue & Toshiaki Kawada to become the new double tag
champions in All Japan. The pairings in the promotion have been shuffled a
bit, with Kobashi & Ace & Patriot forming a regular combination, feuding
with Kawada & Taue & co. as before, Mitsuhara Misawa & Jun Akiyama & co.,
and Steve Williams & The Lacrosse (Jungle Jim Steele) & co.
[ - ] In the Ken Shamrock vs. Vader match, Vader suffered a broken nose in
four places, and thigh and knee injuries.
[ - ] Speculation has the WWF's RAW moving to the 9pm to 11pm slot
beginning in August.
[ - ] Although Nitro doesn't air in this area until Sunday (and then we
only get a one-hour abridged version of the show), it's my
understanding that the Great Muta finally joined the NWO this week after
teasing this for a long time in New Japan.
[ - ] [Nitro ] beat [ RAW ] 05/26 with a 3.3 rating against a 2.8 rating.
After four weeks of unopposed two-hour live shows, RAW was unable to build
enough momentum to give Nitro much competition for a strong rating. The
hourly breakdowns seem to reveal that people were interested in the main
event on RAW, but that they blew off the first hour. The detailed ratings
are a click away.
[ - ] The PPV buy rates of the past six months (year or so) show that the
WWF has an average buy rate of 0.55 (0.54) and average gross of
$1.42-million ($1.41-million), while WCW has an average buy rate of 0.70
(0.65) and average gross of $2.05-million ($1.92-million).
The details as they stand are available.
[ - ] New Japan has a major show at Budokan Hall on 06/05/97, featuring:
* Shinya Hashimoto vs. Keiji Muto for the IWGP Title
* Satoshi Kojima & Manabu Nakanishi vs. Masa Chono & NWO Sting for the
IWGP Tag Titles that Kojima & Nakanishi won on 05/03/97
* Tiger King (Satoru Sayama) vs. Kuniaki Kobayashi (the two had a famous
series of matches in late 1982 and early 1983 when Sayama wrestled as
Tiger Mask)
* Riki Choshu & Tadao Yasuda vs. Kengo Kimura & Takashi Ishikawa
* Top of the Super Junior tournament final match
* Tatsumi Fujinami & Kensuke Sasaki vs. Shiro Koshinaka & Michiyoshi
OharaJunji Hirata & Takashi Iizuka vs. Hiro Saito & Hiroyoshi Tenzan
[ - ] All Japan Pro-Wrestling has a major at Budokan Hall on 06/06/97,
featuring Toshiaki Kawada vs. Mitsuhara Misawa.
[ - ] The WWF has King of The Ring on 06/08/97. Line-up has:
o Undertaker vs. Faarooq for the WWF Title
o Davey Boy Smith & Owen Hart vs. Legion of Doom for the WWF Tag Titles
o Shawn Michaels vs. Bret Hart for a WWF Title shot at SummerSlam. Bret
will never wrestle in the US again if he can't beat Michaels in ten
minutes. The four Hart Foundation members will each be handcuffed to a
different ring post.
o Steve Austin vs. Brian Pillman
o King of the Ring Title Tournament semi-finals and final:
Quarter Finals Semi Finals Finals
Ahmed Johnson
Ahmed Johnson
Hunter Hearst Helmsley
Hunter Hearst Helmsley (replacing Vader)
Hunter Hearst
Helmsley
Crush
Goldust
Jerry Lawler
Jerry Lawler
Mankind
Mankind?
Savio Vega
Jerry Lawler's win over Goldust on this week's RAW was as bad as you might
expect, with Lawler giving a homophobic interview before the match,
including tasteless innuendo directed at Marlena. Lawler's presence in the
tournament weakens things substantially.
The tag title match is in question, given the events of RAW this week.
The 10:00 stipulation in the Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels match tells you
how bad Bret's knee still is. There is speculation that Bret may be unfit
to work the match and that story line will prevail.
[ - ] WCW has the Great American Bash on 06/15/97. Tentative line-up has:
o Diamond Dallas Page vs. Randy Savage
o Scott Hall & Kevin Nash vs. Ric Flair & Roddy Piper
o Steve McMichael vs. Kevin Greene
o Chris Benoit vs. Meng
[ - ] The WWF has [In Your House ] on 07/06/97.
[ - ] WCW has Bash at the Beach on 07/13/97.
[ - ] The WWF has SummerSlam on 08/03/97. Tentative line-up has:
o Undertaker vs. Bret Hart for the WWF Title
[ - ] WCW has Hog Wild on 08/09/97. Tentative line-up has:
o Lex Luger vs. Giant
[ - ] ECW has its second PPV on 08/17/97.
[ - ] The WWF has [In Your House ] on 09/07/97.
[ - ] WCW has Fall Brawl on 09/14/97.
[ - ] The WWF has [In Your House ] on 10/05/97.
[ - ] WCW has Halloween Havoc on 10/26/97.
[ - ] The WWF has Survivor Series on 11/09/97.
[ - ] WCW has World War III on 11/23/97.
[Wing Kanemura gets smashed] [ - ]FMW has a major show in Kawasaki Stadium
on 11/28/97. The scheduled main event has
Atsushi Onita facing Wing Kanemura. They are building to this match by
leaving things loose as to whether Wing Kanemura or Masato Tanaka will face
Onita. Tanaka has begged both Onita and Kanemura for a chance at the match
against Onita. Tanaka & Kanemura had a good **1/2 (maybe ***) match,
running 14:47, on 08/01/96, which showed some potential in each wrestler,
but was sloppy and had a weak second half.
[ - ] The WWF has [In Your House ] on 12/07/97.
[ - ] WCW has Starrcade on 12/28/97.
[ - ] WWW: My home page is at http://math.uwaterloo.ca/~hekunze. The
wrestling portion includes this post, tape lists, awards history,
Japanese wrestling stuff, and other things.
[ - ] Videos: I have posted something about the availability of videos. If
you missed it, I'll send it to you in e-mail upon request. I'm way
behind on tape watching and I haven't had time to respond to tape-related
e-mail. Apologies to anybody who has contacted me, but things are just too
hectic for me these days.
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Thanks to: Masaki Aso.
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E-mail: hekunze@jeeves.uwaterloo.ca